SAN FRANCISCO – Relieved farmers say they’re heartened by the government’s announcement that it’s safe to eat most spinach, but they’re uneasy about the future of their industry, knowing it may take time to win back public confidence.

During the two weeks the E. coli warning about fresh spinach lasted, growers said they anxiously re-examined the safety of their operations, anguished over the suffering of the 187 people who became sick and the one who died, and weathered significant losses as crops went to waste.

“Everybody’s just trying to regroup, working with retailers to put it in the shelves,” said Teresa Thorne, with the Alliance for Food and Farming. “It’s a case of, What can we harvest? And do we have a market for it?'”

It’s too early to tell how hard the industry was hit, but agriculture experts said the industry likely suffered unprecedented economic damage.

In California, where three-quarters of all domestically grown spinach is harvested, farmers could endure up to $74 million in losses, according to researchers working with Western Growers, which represents produce farmers in California and Arizona.

Last year’s spinach crop in California was valued at $258.3 million, and each acre lost amounts to a roughly $3,500 hit for the farmer.

The government gave a partial endorsement to the industry onFriday, with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announcing that most spinach is now “as a safe as it was before this event.”

But the warning remains in place for spinach recalled by Natural Selection Foods LLC of San Juan Bautista, which covered 34 brands in packages with “Best if Used By” dates between Aug. 17 and Oct. 1.

Growers on California’s Central Coast have another four or five weeks to harvest before shutting down for the winter, when spinach production moves to the southern valleys and Arizona.

Because they stagger plantings to allow for an uninterrupted supply, many growers still have young greens maturing now.

When Doug Mosebar, president of the California Farm Bureau, visited the Salinas Valley on Friday to meet with farmers, he found fields of overgrown spinach, too big for the processors, said farm bureau spokesman Dave Kranz.

“Farmers are just waiting to see if they’ll have orders,” said Kranz.

Growers are trying to salvage what they can of their crops, but many say a loss of public confidence is the biggest threat to the industry. Before the E. coli outbreak, health-conscious Americans had driven up demand for spinach in salads and other healthy meals.

California farmers have more than doubled the amount of acres dedicated to spinach to keep up with consumption, from 15,000 acres in 2001 to 31,000 in 2005, with much of the growth being driven by demand for pre-washed, packaged spinach.

But farmers worry that consumers will now look askance at the convenient bagged spinach after E. coli was found in 9 packages of baby spinach from Natural Selection under the Dole brand name.

Still, farmers say they are “relieved that the market is open, and they’re determined to win consumer confidence back,” said Kranz. “They’re really trying to address the public health aspect, because that’s what’s going to make a difference in the long run.”

Spinach growers and processors are relieved, but no one’s under the impression it’s back to business as usual, said Tim Chelling with Western Growers.

The search for the source of the contamination continues.

“No one considers this a shut case,” Chelling said. “No one is going to sit back and relax at this point.”